


I Always Begin Without You

by stardropdream



Category: xxxHoLic
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-23
Updated: 2013-02-23
Packaged: 2017-12-03 09:50:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/696973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardropdream/pseuds/stardropdream
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She can feel it falling apart, no matter how hard she tries to pretend that everything is the same as always.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Always Begin Without You

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted to LJ December 27, 2010.
> 
> This takes place in the Rou timeline, before the time Himawari and Watanuki agree she should only come to the shop once a year.

She realizes, in the back of her head, much sooner before she admits it to herself, before she embraces the aching of her heart. After Yuuko disappears, she tries to act the same as she always does. She chooses a smile from the vocabulary of smiles and settles on one that is both stainless steel and open—this is how she greets Watanuki now, the lost boy who will not and cannot leave the shop grounds now. She thinks to herself that she must still be able to see the shop because she still wishes to see him.   
  
She pretends that everything is alright even when she can see everything falling apart around her. Watanuki does not smile for the first few months. He sits out on the veranda and watches the sky, even if it is blurred with rain and Yuuko’s kimono clings tightly to his shoulders. He shivers, and Himawari and Doumeki step to him. She holds the umbrella over his head as he shoves the towel onto his head and finally coaxes him to come inside. He only comes inside when they remind him that sitting in the rain will ruin Yuuko’s clothes.   
  
In the first weeks, she shows Watanuki how to properly wear and tie a furisode, one of Yuuko’s with soft purple cloth and the butterfly motif. He is thankful. She can see it in the way he holds himself, wearing the fabric, his head bowed reverently as he stares at the butterflies, expecting them to fly and flit in the woven fabric. His eyes stay on the butterflies, even once she and Doumeki leave for the night.   
  
When he does smile again, it is a pained, stretched smile that reminds Himawari far too much of her own, and he has yet to master the hard iron of smiles, to block out any doubt or betray anything beneath the surface. His seem too thinned, too painful. But at least he is smiling, she thinks—he must be feeling better, right?   
  
She tries to act normally, to act as if nothing has changed when everything has changed. Watanuki smiles but mostly keeps to himself, his thoughts centered around one person. Doumeki is quieter than he’d used to be, more thoughtful, more reserved. His hand strays to his pocket often. Even Tanpopo is more reserved than usual—he flies and chirps and sings whenever they are alone, but once she turns the corner of the familiar street and heads towards the shop, he sobers considerably, tucking up onto her shoulder and not moving until they leave again, several hours later.   
  
At school, things are not the same. She goes about her business the same way as before. She does her schoolwork, she answers questions, she talks to the girls in the locker rooms about boys and karaoke and dodges the questions the girls ask her—(“Why don’t you tie your hair up anymore? Isn’t it in the way when we play basketball, Himawari-chan?” “Why do you wait until we’re all done before you change your shirt, Himawari-chan?”)  
  
Doumeki joins her for lunch, but there is a space between them the size of a missing person, and though they speak of inconsequential things, both their minds are on a boy who no longer comes to school. Her food tastes like rubber now that she’s grown used to meals prepared with a smile and blatant affection.   
  
But still, she comes to the shop, without fail. She walks there after school sometimes with Doumeki. Sometimes she comes on the weekends. But she knows that things have changed and she knows that things will only change more.   
  
She can sense it in the way Yuuko’s—now Watanuki’s—helpers stare at her. Maru and Moro watch her with reserve as well. They frolic in the garden, laugh and giggle and cling to Watanuki. But as soon as she steps onto the property, they sober immediately. Their laughing eyes dull as they watch her approach, standing beside Watanuki as if expecting something to happen and yet nothing does. Himawari knows her smile, in those moments, are as tight as Watanuki’s.   
  
The months pass. Sometimes Doumeki tells her she should not come, because Watanuki is hurt. She tells herself it is her fault, that she should be careful from now on. And yet she still returns when Watanuki invites her, with shaky breath over the telephone.   
  
But with every passing visit, she can feel the distance between them. It is painful, to be so close to him and know that they are so far apart. She has grown used to isolation, grown used to being alone. But now that she knows that they do not flee from her, now that she knows that he is happy to have met her—she thinks that is far worse than never having this feeling. She thinks it is worse to have known what it felt like to be loved and happy, and watch the world fall apart around her while she stays exactly the same. She hates to know that there is nothing that she can do, and that she only makes it worse. She has seen the scars he tries so badly to hide beneath the kimono. It makes her own hand fly up to her back, instinctively, touching the scars she’d taken for him in the hope he would never have to suffer the pain of scars again. But she should have known better. She should have known that was a foolish child’s wish.   
  
She knows the end is near when the three of them are sitting on the veranda, Doumeki on Watanuki’s right, and Himawari sitting to his left. She’d been closer until Maru and Moro squeezed their way between them, and she sits near the stairs leading down into the garden, watching Mokona and Mugetsu play together in the grass.   
  
They are out of drinks, so Himawari shifts, rising to her feet. “I’ll get some.”  
  
But Maru and Moro are on their feet faster than her, darting in front of her when she lifts her hand to open the door. They stare up at her, and then slip into the shop. They still watch her as they pointedly slide the door shut, and she hears their feet padding away as they go to retrieve the alcohol.   
  
She stands there, looking at the door, unable to respond. She cannot be angry with them—they are doing what they are meant to do. Protect Watanuki. And she knows, in the back of her mind, that she is spending too much time here—that her luck is contaminating everything.   
  
She steps away from the door, and when she looks over to Watanuki, he is looking up at her, expression pained and apologetic.  
  
“Himawari-chan…” he begins.  
  
She smiles, feels it tighten at the corners. “They’ll be able to get it faster. I still don’t know the shop that well.”  
  
She sits back down, hands in her lap. She looks out over the garden and avoids looking at both Watanuki and Doumeki. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see they are both concerned, but Watanuki is never one to press it, and she knows Doumeki will talk to her once they both leave together. The idea of talking to him overwhelms her, and she stands, abruptly.  
  
“I need to go,” she says, not looking at them.   
  
“Wha—” Watanuki begins.  
  
She smiles, and steps down into the garden, slipping her shoes back on. “I’ll talk to you later, Watanuki-kun.”  
  
But somehow, deep in her gut, she knows it will be much later. She walks away, and knows that the shadows are stretching in the garden, before finally lifting. She knows that as she walks away, everything can breathe easier. She knows that as she walks away, it will only be a matter of time before she cannot come at all. The distance is suffocating, painful, and she knows that, no matter what promises and emotions she and Watanuki share, there is no way it can hold up what cannot be stabilized.   
  
That night, Watanuki breaks his promise never to make her cry for the second time.


End file.
